It is my belief that not everyone is capable of mastering each topic. That there aren't enough potential great teachers to make this possible unless you do some sort of selection method.

Harvard gets great results but they select who enters the university. If you want almost everyone to pass and to know the material then some sort of pre-selection criteria must be met.

Your conclusions from your example are factually not true, because there are schools where everyone gets a "good education" that do not have pre-selection criteria. I would also agree that not everyone is capable of "mastering each topic," but why do you need to master them and why do they need to know each topic? I'm sorry, I just don't feel like you answered my question. I don't think you need great teachers to have everyone learn material. The onus of learning should be on the student and our goals for what students should learn are maligned with this concept. The fact that there isn't a definition for bad teachers doesn't mean there aren't bad teachers (you have to agree with this) and that something shouldn't be done about them. The way that I look at the three points you have numbered is that the first one follows from the other two. By working to redefine classroom expectations to closer align with placing responsibility on students for doing the learning, we can realize that more people can effectively learn appropriate material to a satisfactory comprehension level.

Yes, there are schools where everyone gets a good education without a pre selection criteria. They do not, however, posses the property that almost all of the students pass and almost all of the students know the material. You can't get all three conditions to be true simultaneously.

Of course there are bad teachers.

The onus of learning should be on the students? Sure. But then you aren't going to get almost everyone knowing the material because most people don't want to learn.

I'm sorry, I still don't understand how these three things can't be filled simultaneously, you just keep saying they can't without giving me any more reason. Feel free to respond by explaining or not, I'm just curious why that's the case. I agree that a large number of students don't want to learn, but a lot of those students also just don't learn, in which case why are we paying to "teach" them?

By definition, if a large number of students don't want to learn then it is trivially true that we aren't going to get

2. Almost everyone to pass. 3. Almost everyone who passes to know the material.

unless we exclude them from the system. Property 1 was that almost everyone goes to school.

In my experience, children are very curious. I'm very skeptical when teachers claim otherwise, despite them having experience with many children, since they're often the ones pummeling that curiosity out of them as part of the job. (http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.htm)